


Normal in Ambres

by TailaBlu



Category: Original Work
Genre: Ambres, Lorestuff, Normal in Ambres, nia - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-15
Updated: 2019-01-15
Packaged: 2019-10-10 14:27:49
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 19,136
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17427656
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TailaBlu/pseuds/TailaBlu
Summary: A lonesome, troubled young man makes a new friend. She smells like sewage.





	1. Takeru

Ambres was a normal place. In the mornings it was lively and colorful. People went to school, or went to stores, or went to work. When the sun began to sink past the mountains and their structures, people’s presence began gradually thinning in the streets, before finally whittling down to nothing. The events of each day were stunningly standard. “Oh, did you hear? The Glowflies won this year’s tournament, we’re gonna have our boys home as winners!” “Oh, that’s great! The Puffers had no clue what was coming!”

Sports teams aside, they’d often gossip about passing tragedies here and there. Perhaps the most normal thing about Ambres is that the morbid curiosity of the masses was inescapable. “Did you hear what happened to the Coggs family? Poor boy… he’s all alone!” “I know, how terrible! Still, it’s difficult to provide for a boy with such a trouble in these times....”

Oftentimes people attributed their inaction to an innate inability. They talked about how difficult things would be, if they’d tried - as if they knew already through sheer self-understanding. Self-care is not a crime, but when you don’t try in the first place…

The nights of Ambres were notable for their quietness. Not that the outside world would go quiet, no, it’s that people didn’t want to go back outside after dark, after they’d settled into their comfortable little homes. And why should they, when the talk of the town was a new, irrefutably frightening reveal: someone was living up in the mountains, with a clear view of all of them. Or, well, that was what was being spread. Like a wildfire, the most negative rumors get out quicker than the rumors of puppies living in the forest or magical woodland critters who could talk.

Up in the mountains, where it was cold and unbearably unapproachable, sat a large facility surrounded by its own security measures. It wasn’t modern, either - not in its entirety. It looked like a Victorian castle, but with the technology to keep it running for hundreds of years, even without constant maintenance. Sometimes people ventured up on half-witted dares and came back with accounts of strange and horrific noises from deep within the facility. Some have even claimed to have heard the cries of the dead. None of them actually ventured inside, though, so whether it’s truth remains to be seen.

The Coggs boy used to be just as normal as the rest of them, before that unfortunate incident. It was said that a large, likely very hungry marine animal attacked him, causing an infection that ravaged his arm and threatened to do the same to his body if it weren’t cut off. Or, at least, that’s what many people say. The Coggs boy himself, Takeru, maintains a different story. He swears on his life that the creature was no ordinary fish of any kind. It was reptilian and humongous, and it opened its jaws wide, stealing away and likely killing his sister, and taking his arm with it.

Because of the frightening and downright unbelievable characteristics of his tale, he began to become lonesome. People tend to value their own reputation when they believe they will be seen as lesser for talking to someone. The best anyone could muster was a ‘condolences’ phrase like “I’m so sorry for your loss” or “I wish you the best going forward”. Nothing could mend the broken heart of the boy - his parents were stuck on another continent entirely, and unable to come back home. He had to arrange his own funeral for his fallen sister, and send pictures to his family to receive their approval. Even after he’d wow’d them at the sheer respect he’d paid her, he couldn’t find it within himself to open up again. He became angry, frustrated, sad, alone. People didn’t talk to him anymore not only on account of their own self-conscious natures, but also on the account of him slowly becoming more and more abrasive. Speaking to people was difficult when everything they said to you reminded you of someone who you’d lost mere weeks before. Still locked in intense grief, and unable to get out of it, Takeru became the troubled Coggs boy. The one who lived alone and might even die alone, if his mental state didn’t return to its former glory.

Normality could’ve been killing him, really. Nobody reached out, or even offered a shoulder to cry on. It felt uncouth, to intrude on the boy’s business, and so he slowly became a pariah, even to those who could understand his plight. Day after day he found it more and more difficult to function on his own. Every single thing he did reminded him of his loss, and made him withdraw more and more. Some days he didn’t bother rising up out of bed, not out of lack of want to, but simply because trying to do so was an unbearable task. Facing a world that’d decided to shun him instead of try to help him wasn’t even the motivation - it was his exhaustion, with not only himself, but the world.

It was one night that changed everything. From seemingly nowhere, even meteorologists were caught unawares, the clouds emptied heavy rain onto the city of Ambres. It was suggested everyone stay inside until the storm subsided. Ten inches of rain came down, and quickly made its way away from the city, down the long, structural slope. Takeru, alone in his dark and gloomy house, power knocked out by the torrent of rain and flashes of lightning, looked outside and caught sight of something odd. Fighting against the incoming rainwater splishing and splashing down the street, a small figure was making their way out of a manhole.

He blinked once. Twice. Turning his head away for a moment to address the oh-so-lonely fireplace, he asserted that was a reality, and currently not alight, as he had never lit it. He turned his gaze to the street again. Still out there, clawing their way up despite the deluge. Their hair clung haphazardly to every part of their face, making their slow escape from the sewer rather uncomfortable. The night was darker than ever, and aside from the flashes of crackling, booming strikes of lightning, the figure had very little to go off of, as did Takeru. However, through the flashes, he caught sight of something that made him leap to his feet.

They were coughing up some sort of liquid that caught the light. It was greenish and cloudy. Whoever this was, they had sewer water inside of them. The concern bubbling up within him seemed to overtake everything else. His breath caught in his throat and, in a quick motion, he rushed blindly for his first aid kit - which was far more than that if anyone cared to look inside and take note of all of the potions and life-saving remedies he’d packed within - and rushed outside.

Slowly making it up to their feet, the small figure was shivering and holding themselves. Their clothing was soaked wet and clinging to them as desperately as they clung to their own body heat. Water dripped off of them constantly as if they were being assaulted by a water faucet - and considering the flash flood-tier torrent happening at the time, she could just as easily have been. Running to her, despite the danger of slipping and hurting himself further in the rain, was Takeru. At the first touch of her shoulder, he withdrew suddenly - she was colder than he’d been expecting - but he took hold the second go and began to lead her towards his house. While anyone else wouldn’t just quietly worried and asked for help from authorities, Takeru was well equipped to help her, and knew what to do.

The door shut behind them with a loud THUNK. Still shivering, the figure was dripping rainwater onto the ground. The taller looked down at the smaller, “How much did you swallow?”

No reply. Instead, the tiny figure continued shivering, looking up at him with mild confusion. This was a type of confusion he hasn’t seen in a while - she likely couldn’t understand him. Her eyes, wide and watery, kept locked onto him until he couldn’t bare looking at them anymore. He frowned a little, shutting his eyes for a moment before kneeling down to her, still gripping his First Aid kit. “The sewer water leading in through Ambres is very poisonous,” he explained, popping the container open, “You’ll get really sick if you don’t take something. You might even die.”

At ‘die’, the tiny figure flinched. Despite her apparent incomprehension of the other words, she immediately picked up the meaning of that one. Knowing her fear, he nodded, “I know, it’s scary. The symptoms are very bad, too. That’s why I need you to take this.” He sifted through the container, before grabbing a hold of some odd, slightly glowing liquid in a mason jar. He reached out the jar, offering it to her.

The first thing she did when she grabbed it was sniff it. From bottom to top, the girl sniffed and sniffed and sniffed, trying to figure out any abnormalities that may lie in wait if she were to consume it. Then, she unscrewed the lid, settling the very tip of her tongue into the liquid. Her eyes dilated, and she began lapping it up with her tongue alone.

Takeru chuckled with amusement. “You drink like a Felicite,” he said, watching as she angled the jar to allow for more consumption of the honey-like liquid via her lapping. Then, when his comment was noticed by her, she paused her drinking to tilt her head inquisitively at him.

“Oh, so you can understand me, sorta?”

Her only reply was a very slight nod. Her tongue still hung out of her mouth, some of the glowing and sparkling liquid on the tip of it.

“Okay, you might be from somewhere far off. So, Felicites are disciples of this Goddess named The Kat God. They’re so devoted to Her that their appearance changes with the more they pay allegiance to Her. Now, I’m not some sorta historian, but I love researching other cultures. It’s fun to learn more about the types of people you’ll meet out there, y’know? Anyway, what I learned is that The Kat God is heavily associated with fire, heat, passion, and justice. She values the preservation of life very highly, and also values the natural cycle of life. She views things such as Necromancy, the art of raising the dead, as a perversion of the cycle of life. Her followers who breach the cycle of life by pursuing necromancy and junk like that are given the title of Rogue Felicite, and although they may still be loyal to Her, they typically are given less ‘benefits’ than most Felicites.”

The look of incomprehension had ruled over the girl’s face again, and the boy sighed, “I shouldn’t infodump on you all of a sudden. You don’t even know where you are, do you?” She shook her head, apparently understanding that as well.

“Well, considering you’re not getting sicker, and you’re not shivering anymore… I’d say the solution worked.” Takeru got up from his kneeling position, stretching his body for a moment before noticing something. The storm which was ravaging the outside world had quieted, as did the outside. It almost felt strange when he noticed it, but then he quickly attributed it to the quiet nature of Ambres’ nights. He looked back down at the small figure, before kneeling down to pick her up. She was still soaking wet, and it wouldn’t be fair to abandon the responsibility he’d thrust onto himself by letting her stay soaking wet. If she stayed that way, she could get sick!

. . .One Bath Later. . .

After the small girl’s bath, she’d been situated in one of Takeru’s old T-shirts he kept around. The Coggs family never moved, and only really bought what they were in need of. Because of this, Takeru had his old shirts from when he was a child, himself.

It was funny, to try to compare himself to her. He was a lax young man, with tanned skin and messy platinum-white hair. He wore long-sleeved attire, such as his black hoodie over his shirt, to obscure the fact he no longer had one of his arms. His prosthetic, one donated to him in a kind act and surprisingly realistic, was often mistaken for a real arm until its full length was revealed. Due to a few sleepless nights beforehand, he’d grown to look more tired, leading to the observations of his neighbors and peers that he’d looked much less happy. He was much taller than the small girl, though this was because of his age, being about 15 years old.

The young girl, meanwhile, was of undetermined age. Perhaps she was 11 or 12, Takeru couldn’t be sure. She could’ve been older, and just appeared younger, but again, difficult to determine. Considering she fit just fine in his childhood shirts, she wasn’t very big at all. Her skin was a chocolatey color, with thick lips and fluffy black hair. Perhaps the strangest thing about her was the combination of her hair and eyes. There was one streak of hair that was platinum white, like Takeru’s head of hair. Her irises, meanwhile, were strange enough on their own. It was like they were opalescent, with the base color being blue. The oddest part of all was that, while all others had perfectly normal, black pupils, this young girl’s pupils were blue - lighter than her irises. Her hair had that odd, iridescent sheen overall, as well.

It was that odd quality of her that made Takeru first suspect that she was not all that she seemed to be. While she seemed innocent, behaved innocently, and was obedient for the most part, she gave off this odd aura. Takeru prided himself on being a pretty okay judge of character, and while he didn’t sense ill intent, he did sense an ill sense of being within the girl. This alone made him want to care for her already. She seemed injured, internally scarred by something. He didn’t want to invade her privacy, but part of him desperately wanted to know what had happened to get her in the sewers in the first place.


	2. Takeru's Dream

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Why did this have to happen? We used to be so happy.

All was dark. It felt tangible. Reaching out brought the skin in contact with disgusting, slimy, ice-cold and stringy black substance. Yet when he looked at his arms- no, his arm- he didn’t see anything dripping off of himself. His senses were fooling him, whether it was his eyes not perceiving the presence of the darkness on his skin, or his skin perceiving something when there was actually nothing at all.

It was this one again, wasn’t it?

Already he felt the anxiety rising up in his throat. He was terrified, who wouldn’t be? He knew the ending of this dream all too well, and yet he felt the same fear he felt the first time. The second time. The third time. He should’ve been used to it by now, but its everlasting presence only made things worse. He looked around. He knew if he searched hard enough, he could find her. And when he found her, this terror could be over sooner. Hopefully.

There, reaching out of the sea of darkness like a statue, frozen mid-panic, eyes bulging wide and tears forming in them, was  _ her _ . The anxiety turned into a heavy ball of lead and fell through his heart and into his stomach. No. No, no, no! He wanted to refuse this nightmare its audience. He was the only one who was having it, so he could leave, right? He could go!

But he approached her anyway. His mind knew he was in a dream, but his heart didn’t. It even fooled his gut. He felt nausea stirring up, and it felt too real to be a dream, for a second. He was approaching the statue of his sister. She was still reaching up. The more he tried to push himself to become painfully aware that this was his mind punishing him for failing his own family, the more the dream seemed to realize it needed to play dirty.

Something began to materialize. It started with marrow, then bone, tendon, muscle, fat, and then skin. The arm he was missing was in her grasp. Her body, halfway outside of the shadowy abyss began to move. She began to sob. It was a painful noise to his ears - not because it was shrill and cacophonous, but because, well, that was his little sister. It sounded… new. His mind wasn’t borrowing from anything, exactly, besides her voice. He knew how she sounded when she was upset, or afraid, or panicked, and now his mind was using that knowledge to destroy him.

_ “I have your arm,” _ she began, her voice a shrill wail,  _ “Brother, where is the rest of you?” _

Her visage was contorted into one of abject pain and sorrow, and yet she clung to the bleeding, dying limb like it was one of her stuffed toys.  _ “Takeru!” _ She cried, holding on still as her skin became paler and paler, harkening to a corpse rather than a live and terrified girl..

**_“Where’s the rest of you?!”_ **

Takeru shot upright with a harsh inhalation of air. To compensate, he exhaled harshly too, and quickly a pattern asserted itself. He could almost swear he heard water somewhere. He heard splashing, he  _ knew it _ . He clung to his pillow, sweat dampening his bedhead to a soggy mess as he begged into his pillow for everything to stop.

As his breaths slowly became his again, his exhausted form slowly became at ease. He was good at centering himself, at least. He’d learned quickly from the first few times. Now if only he could carry that skill into the dreaming world, that’d definitely be something.

His eyes slowly guided themselves towards the LED clock. 4:00 AM. Great. Fantastic. At least this was the time he’d usually be up making her breakfast. His eyes shut tightly. Don’t think of it like that. Don’t turn everything into a problem… His shut eyes squinted a little as he put extra concentration into his desperate action. Don’t. It’s okay. Breathe.

When he opened them, it was 4:02. He sighed. Cooking for the new house-guest wouldn’t hurt, would it? It didn’t sound as if she were awake. Slowly he got out of bed. Using his own sense of himself, he messed with his bedhead until it became something bearable to look at. He trudged off to the kitchen, turning on and quickly dimming lights as he did. He liked to call himself a morning person, but he was truly a mourning person. He typically forced himself to get up early so that the people getting up at 5 and later would assume he likes mornings, when really he just got himself out of an unbearable panic attack before anyone even knew he was going through it.

If he could force himself to rise up and do something, maybe someday it wouldn’t be forcing anymore.


	3. Pancake Batter

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I don't know where I am. Why is he so kind?  
> Si tir ti vucot svaklar si mi. Kii ui jaci zyak cirau?

Stirring out of her own slumber, the young girl was met with very lovely scents. Savory, sweet, that hint of loving ambrosia that is baked batter. Her rousing came forth in the form of her eyes fluttering open, before her body rose as if it had no bones to leave her in a sitting-up position. Adjusting herself so she didn’t look as if she’d been horribly maimed without realizing it, she got up onto her feet and stretched. The sound of her feet hitting the wooden floor was comparable to a wet rubber ducky falling onto bathroom tile.

She let out a soft, barely-audible yawn. She blinked a few times, beginning to take in her surroundings. Her eyes meandered from glorious windows decorated with beautiful silken curtains to couches that were soft and velvety enough to make someone fall asleep in minutes. Slowly, she realized where she currently was, and fell into a strange sense of paradoxical hope and despair. Eyes bulging wide, her mind still reeling with the small vestiges of her understanding of the world she’d found herself in, she quickly approached the source of those delicious smells.

Running past lonesome framed photographs and hauntingly empty rooms, the girl rushed through the dining room and into the kitchen with a frightening, newfound feverishness. Takeru had never seen her this way, before she was a tiny and almost pathetic little wisp, and now her personality was shining through: a wild spitfire who was all-too-eager to taste his cooking. She had the feeling he couldn’t really complain as she stuffed her face with a large, syrup-soaked pancake.

She’d made the counter into her new seat, licking the sweetness off of her fingertips as the teenager stared at her. For some time, his expression went through many shifts. Confusion, concern, bits of anger and disgust, awe, adoration, and the tiniest hint of rapture. The mixture of emotions, playing over an amount of time over his features, made the girl want to giggle, but doing so with a full mouth would be inadvisable. To spare herself the choking, she gulped down the food and then giggled at him.

“Yeah, well, what about...” he began, before he gestured at her, wordlessly. He just couldn’t define it, the change she’d showed. All this did was illicit an even more impish giggle from her. It was obvious that his confusion was what amused her, and despite the outright disrespect in it, her childish air made it difficult for him to be angry at her.

“Look, kid, I don’t even know your name. I’ve been going through some stuff, so you’re lucky you’re even still in my house.”

“Hows!” She parroted almost identically, giggling at him still.

“Why is it you can only understand bits and pieces? I don’t get it!”

“Unner-stan!” She giggled again, before pausing. Her giggle faded into deep thought, before her odd blue eyes settled to stare at Takeru. Bringing her hands down from her face and onto the counter, she began leaning closer and closer to the boy, causing him to lean back awkwardly. “What are you… doing?” He asked, though he knew he might not get a verbal answer.

His answer was quickly given to him when, in a quick and vicious motion, she headbutt him without the addition of her withdrawal. She struck him dizzy, but he couldn’t stumble away with her pressing her forehead against him. It was almost… magnetized. He couldn’t pull away, not because his legs couldn’t keep him upright out of his confusion, but because resting his forehead against her forehead seems the most preferable. As he regained his composure, forehead still pressed to hers, he finally caught sight of her eyes. Her milky white, vacant eyes…

And suddenly, it feels as if something is being purloined. The sensation is easy to liken to having a severe fever, and sweating it out. His eyes, initially a soft, aqua color, began to dull into an odd, murky, dark and greyish steel. He begins to try to make words, but he is stricken with aphasia. He tries the word “what” and gets a strange, animal sound that is just barely approaching the qualifier for voice. The world seems to be spinning for a moment. The girl’s hair is flowing as if a hurricane is tearing through the kitchen. All he can feel is a sure, frightening, all-too-real unpleasantness that pierces the veil of his reality and leaves him wondering if anything is sacred at all.

And then, just as quickly as it began, the sensation stops. His eyes return back to normal. He is suddenly returned to his full state of mind, able to create and sound out words without practice. He barely remembers his existential questioning, and part of him wants to just leave it alone. Trying to shake the leftover buzzing and fizzing in his skull, it almost feels like he can feel his own brain jiggling around, but his brain also assures him it’s merely a momentary delusion. Once the feeling fades, he’s at least partially back to sorts. Trembling, still trying to truly compute what just occurred, he locked eyes with the strange girl and blurted out, “What in the  _ world _ was  _ that?! _ ”

“What in the world was what?” She repeated, not so much parroting as asking for clarification. Her voice no longer carried that juvenile, mocking tone. It was as if she knew that the syllables he sounded out made something that held meaning, and not only that, that she now understood that meaning as well.

“That!!” He yelled, pointing at her forehead. It didn’t even hold a hint of having been slammed into his forehead, meanwhile Takeru’s forehead still was sore. The girl blinked a few times, as if things were being sorted in her mind, before she cracked a surprisingly awkward smile, “Ah! Oh, I see what you mean. That whole spell I did!”

“Spell?!” He now parroted, though this one was out of surprise, “What the- What spell even was that?! Why’d you smack me right in my forehead?! You could’ve really hurt me, y’know?!” The girl sat in silence again, fingers worrying her chin before she chirped up, “It’s going to sound really silly, now that I’m saying this… but before I conducted that spell, I only knew a little bit of Common! It’s like how you can tell what words mean in a different language based off of how they sound!”

“Yes, yes, that’s nice, but it doesn’t tell me why you hit me.” He stressed each syllable carefully, holding back his frustration with her in order to not frighten her.

“‘ _ Wer Irthir Tija _ ’. The Knowledge Spell. It grants whoever uses it knowledge of the specific thing they are lacking in that specific information, and burns that information into their heads forever using the memories of the supplied vessel - that’s you - to create a permanent and long-standing connection to their informational source!”

“It feels like you just slapped a bunch of phrases together to make yourself sound smarter,” Takeru chuckled, giving her a slightly incredulous look.

The small girl bounced a little in place, holding a finger up in the air as if doing that alone demanded all of the attention in the world, “I basically mean that because I went ahead and formed this weird connection with you - which does involve the forehead thingy, sorry by the way - I can now  _ speak Common! _ ”

“So you did a weird spell and now you can understand me.”

“Basically!”

“You could’ve just said- ...Nevermind.” He said, letting her have that moment. He then leaned back a little, looking up at the ceiling before pinching the bridge of his nose, “Ugh. God. I go from having responsibility, to having it stolen from me… To… thrusting more responsibility onto myself.”

“What do you mean?” The girl asked, leaning forward a little in her impromptu seating. Eyes still closed and bridge of nose still pinched he replied, “ _ No. _ You’re a little girl. I’m sure your parents are worried sick about you.”

“Little girl?” She snorted, screwing up her face a little at the remark. As quickly as he’d resigned into annoyance, he found himself drawn out of it by a sense of shame, “Oh! Are you not a little girl? I’m sorry, it’s just, you’re very-”

“I’m not THAT little, I’m like, maybe, I’d say.. ...Mm, how does this world work out?”

“What do you mean?”

“How does your living space work? Does it congratulate you on living another ‘year’ after a certain amount of time?”

“Uh, sort of? I mean, I have birthdays.”

“Yeah!” She squeaked, pointing at him, “Birthdays! ‘Congratulations on living another year! For this you receive my praise’!” As she put on the deeper voice for her impression, she pantomimed being some larger, more imposing man congratulating some tiny insect on moving up in the world, even if just slightly. The movements brought a chuckle out of Takeru, “Jeez, where did you grow up? My parents threw me birthdays all the time! Y’know, streamers, cake, ice cream? This year, they actually came home for my birthday! Man, that was great…”

But the girl was confused once again. Squinting slightly at him, she’d turned the mentioned words into a question. “‘Streamers’? ‘Cake’? ‘Iced cream’? Those’re pretty weird spell names, if they are spells. ...What do you people even do here?”

“...Streamers are…” He paused, folding his arms and looking off into a particularly interesting point in the wall, before finishing his thought with, “...these colorful strips of paper that decorate the walls.” As he said it, he envisioned twirling, sparkling streamers hanging down from the ceiling. “Sometimes, they color code them. For me, my colors are black and blue. They aren’t really my favorite colors in the world, but they’re pretty nice. I think all colors are pretty perfect, though. The last time I hung up rainbow streamers, though, I was a little kid.”

“How little?”

“As little as you look,” He chuckled. The girl began to pout up at him, “Hey, no fair, hold on! Uh, let me think here… Uh… How long is… uh…”

“A year? That’s how we count age here.”

“Yeah, those! How long’re those?”

“Uh, a year is 365 days. It’s when the world turns around completely on its axis as it circles the sun.”

“...Oh. Weird. I’ve never even heard of a… What was it, ‘sun’? But it also sounds…  _ familiar. _ ”

“Familiar, huh? Well, despite all your talk, you don’t really look like an alien,” He smirked, deciding to lean against the counter beside her. The girl frowned up, balling her hands into fists and slamming them down onto her legs, “Aww, I don’t?! No fair, I’m totally an alien, and you should know that I am when you look at me!”

‘It’s not like you look like you’re from here, either’, he thought, careful to keep the impression hidden from his facial expression. Changing the subject before it could become obvious what he’d just thought, he said, “So, where’re you from? Since you’re an ‘alien’ and all.”

“Well, uh, I think the best name for it would be what He called it,” she began, tapping on her knee as she tried to recall. When she did, she blurted out, “ _ Quellar di Yorir _ ! Err, it means ‘House of Learning’ in my mother tongue. It’s this really big place, with people just like me in it. Though, uh, I think I’m the smallest.”

“So uh… How many times did they congratulate you?”

“Mmm… I know it’s more than this many,” she said, holding up all ten fingers. “It… It was a little more than this,” she strained, before putting all ten down and counting out four more fingers, “This! This much. Uh..” She actually broke into a bit of a sweat, trying to figure out the proper name for such an amount.

“Oh! Uh..” He got off of the counter, turning to face her, “Hold on, go back.”

“Back to where?”

“This,” he said, as he gently moved three of her fingers down, leaving her index finger up. “This amount is ‘one’. Repeat after me, okay? ‘One’.”

“One.”

He brought up her second finger - the middle finger - “‘Two’.”

“Two.”

He nodded a little, slowly continuing up the numbers. When he would count, she followed suit. He’d go up a number, then repeat the last numbers consecutively that led up to that number, to help cement the ideas in her head. As he aided her, he felt a light wrenching in his heart. Getting so attached to a mystery person so quickly couldn’t have been healthy, right? Here she was, some odd young girl who clawed her way out of a sewer the night before, and now he was teaching her the words for different numerical amounts. If he wasn’t careful, he’d go up to 30.

Having someone depend on him like this…

_ “Hey, bro.” _

He jolted out of his lesson, looking up at the girl. He’d knelt down slightly, so as to not intimidate her while he taught her, getting on her level so she’d listen much better. She blinked a few times, “...Uh, I never got your name. If I don’t-”

“Takeru,” he blurted, coming off curt when really he’d just been startled. Trying to find good phrasing, but rushing, he stammered out, “ _ Don’t _ call me bro. Okay?”

“..Uh.. … O… kay?”

“Okay... Okay. So, where were we?” He asked, trying to ignore the chill that was starting to settle over him. “Uh… I think we were at… thirr… thirr-tee-fore?”

He knew he’d go over if he weren’t careful. Sighing, and rubbing his eyes, he said, “Ugh. Sorry. Uh, I’ll teach you better later. Excuse me.”

“No, no listen! Look, look! One, two, the- three. Three. Four. Five. Six…” She began counting out the numbers he’d just taught her, and as she did, a ball of something he couldn’t put words to began to settle in his stomach. All he knew was that the feeling of having it there was the very opposite of pleasant. “...Seven. Eight. Nine- Is that right? Yeah, nine. Ten. Ee-lev-... Levvin. Eleven. Twelve. Thirteen…”

“I have to go,” he said firmly, feeling as if storm clouds were beginning to swarm his mind, “I need to.. Err.. tend to the garden. Yeah. That…”

“Magpie.”

“...What?”

“Magpie. That’s my... name. Uh..” Her eyes had sunk down to look at her hands, whose fingers were fiddling with each other awkwardly. “When I… When I absorbed your knowledge of language, I felt this word, ‘magpie’, and I felt.. Warm. When I came across it.”

“..Wait, so, your parents didn’t give you that name?”

“That’s something I’ve been meaning to ask, actually.. What are these ‘parents’ like?”

“Are you from an orphanage or some-”

“No, wait, another question, you said that they ‘name you’, right? But can other people name you??”

“Yeah, they’re called nicknames, actually, but-”

“Where does the ‘nick’ in nicknames come from??”

“That’s not- Listen, Magpie, I want to know where you came from. Where did you come from? Why do you not know what parents are? Even orphans I know know what parents are. They teach orphanage kids that someday they’ll have parents, so they know what they are, obviously. How come you don’t know?”

“...Jeez, am I really that weird?” The girl slumped to the side a little, again displaying an odd, boneless appearance in her movements. This caused Takeru to flinch a little, though he didn’t say anything. Straightening herself back up slightly, so as to not slouch anymore, she began, “I think I had some. Or, uh, I used to.”

He immediately felt his heart ache a little at her tone of voice. It wasn’t necessarily heartbroken, it was the tone of someone who very vaguely knew something, and the fact that tone was applied to having parents made him hurt inside. “It’s like.. Uh..” “Take your time.” “I had someone like that. I know I did. More than one. Two. Two of them. I don’t remember their faces, or really anything about how they looked, but…”

“Can you remember their voices?”

Magpie’s eyelids fluttered a little as she stared down at her hands. She pictured them smaller, squishier, much more delicate. She could faintly imagine their voices, melodious and dominant, but it was the type of dominance that made her feel safe. Her eyes seemed to be stinging a little, “..I.. I think so, yes.”

“I..” He began, before trailing off. Dumping his grief on top of hers would be incredibly selfish, wouldn’t it? Unbelievably so, even. Magpie was murmuring, still looking down at her hands. She probably didn’t want him to make this about himself. Tentatively he said, “I’m sorry you don’t know your parents.”

With the quickness of Magpie snapping her head back up to look at him, he jolted. He could see the shine of tears developing in her eyes... Had he offended her? He usually was so good at wording himself, but it didn’t mean he couldn’t ever make mistakes. Carefully and with a hint of worry he clarified, “A lot of people get to know their parents, even if they lose them later. But you… never really got to know them, did you? Well, I’m sorry about that.”

They shared a small bout of silence before a small smile formed on the strange girl’s face. Chuckling awkwardly, she sighed, “ _ Vinxa. _ You’re very kind...” She sniffled harshly, wiping some of the tears off of her face, “God, this place is odd… Are all of the others from here as kind as you?”

As he thought of his peers, the ones who abandoned him quickly and those who did so slowly and without intent, he felt a small bitterness boiling up before squashing it down again. It’d be irrational to get so angry over them, especially right now. “They are… Well, they can vary. It’s hardly their fault, sometimes situations come up.”

“Situations?”

“Things happen that none of them can help sometimes.” He said, narrowly resisting the urge to pick at his false limb. “Sometimes people can’t… handle things. It’s horrible, but that’s how it is sometimes.”

“That’s not-” Magpie blurted, before quieting herself. Her eyes sank from Takeru’s face, avoiding a quizzical look from him. She fidgeted uncomfortably, before repeating and finishing her sentence, “That’s not what you really think about it.”

He sighed, rubbing the back of his neck. Of course he’d be called out on his attitude about it someday but… by someone he’d just met? It felt a tad odd… “How would you know that?”

“You don’t sound… not happy, no, content. Content. You don’t sound content about what they’re doing, at all. You… it doesn’t feel... Right. That they’re letting you deal with this by yourself, whatever you’re dealing with.”

“...I’m not dealing with anything.”

“I mean… if you say so, but… I don’t know, it’s hard to explain.” She shook her head at herself as she said it, obviously disbelieving herself. Then, she tried to put it into words, “It’s a feeling in your stomach, and it feels ‘right’, but you have the chance to doubt it, even if it doesn’t feel like a good idea.”

“You have a gut-feeling I’m dealing with something?” Takeru asked, a little surprised at it. Magpie nodded. The urge to be honest with her rose yet again, but he squashed it as quickly as he did his bitterness. To pour everything on her would, again, be absolutely heartless.

“Okay, how about… You get off of the counter now?”

“Oh, right!” She scooted herself a little forward, before dropping down from the counter and landing on her feet. As if testing to see if all of her joints were in working order, she jogged in place while staring down at her legs, before stopping and nodding to herself.

“As far as I can tell,” Takeru began, putting his hand to his chin, “You don’t have anywhere to go from here-” “I don’t,” She asserted curtly. “And since you don’t, that means you might have to go to the orphanage.”

“Why can’t I stay here?”

As soon as the words caused even a modicum of the thought, Takeru frowned. Something about her living in this house, where his dear sister had lived, felt… disrespectful, and yet respectful, at the exact same time. If he decided for her to stay, she most certainly wouldn’t be taking his sister’s room.

“It would be… …” He trailed off. If he said no, it’d confirm something was definitely going on with him. As happy as he could later be to have support from someone…

“...Something.” He finished, averting his eyes. “And don’t go trying to be weird and reading me or whatever, it’ll be something.”

“Somethings can be good, I think,” Magpie said matter-of-factly.

He began trying to search for reasons to say “no” in his head, but he was exhausted of doubting himself. Taking a deep breath and resigning himself to relaxation he said, “Fine. You can stay here.” Not-so-purposefully cutting off Magpie’s rejoicing he said, “Just, don’t go into the room with the pink door. That one belongs to someone special.”

“Eh? Someone special? Are you ‘ _ with _ ’ someone? I do not understand what the term means in its entirety, but I did absorb from your knowledge that it is a hallmark of people your age!” She giggled as she said it, as if she’d recited the numbers he’d taught her back to him perfectly. Takeru was relieved for her to not dive into the realm of ‘knowing-too-much’ again, and gave an awkward chuckle instead of a dignified response. “Not really with them anymore but, she was important to me.”

_ ‘“Sister” jahus jathila ekess wux. Wux zklaen tepoha coanwor ekess jacioniv lae algbo,’  _ Magpie thought to herself. Outwardly, she simply smiled up at him, “That’s nice. You were probably important to her too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> draconic..twilightrealm..com ;)


	4. The Colors of the Sky Are Green And Purple

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Of course everyone is after me. Why wouldn't they be?

In Ambres, the markets are the talk of the town when nothing else pops up. They sell funny fruit that people talk about, but Magpie doesn’t really understand them all that much. It’s like they know what they are, but they won’t explain it to people they don’t know. She didn’t know if it was really a malicious effort or not, but she did know that it was quite the oddity, to her. After she was rescued from one hell of a stomach-ache by Takeru, she’d become someone who lived in his home and dealt with a strange, semi-welcome feeling. She almost preferred the stomach-ache to being able to sense turmoil and not being able to do anything about it.

One of the funny fruit she loved looking at were grapes. The people selling them used big words like “cultivated” and expected every single person listening to not only know what they meant, but also hang onto every word.

She had come to wonder if the citizens of Ambres thought she was dull. Not in an insulting manner, no, dull in the sense of pity. “Oh, poor girl, she doesn’t know what these words mean. She must’ve hit her head.” There was no use in arguing against it, either, it took Takeru long enough to realize she hadn’t lied when she said she was an ‘alien’.

By ‘alien’, she meant she wasn’t from Ambres, or possibly even his plane of existence.

* * *

 

Another classless brute. Someone out for his bounty, likely to spend it on whatever interdimensional mead they’d fancied. If he could summon the courage at the moment to say whatever he’d wished about them, he’d spit out that they were pathetic for clinging to temporary pleasures. However, just as quickly as the thought came to mind, he realized he’d be one amazing hypocrite.

“C’mon, kid. Give it up, and come with me,” The large figure said. They were heavily scaled, their stomach pooching out to provide evidence for the man’s mead-suspecting judgement. His face was like that of an alligator’s, fangs poking out of the jaws and sparkling, glowing drool dripping down. From head to toe, the figure was a deep maroon, where his scales were rumored to originally have been white. They were holding some sort of heavy gatling gun, except the ammo appeared to be some sort of volatile stardust. They snorted a little, before blowing a bit of the stardust out of their own nose.

He wasn’t well acquainted with his kind, and he was never really willing to be. He only knew that the type of creature to snort out stardust without harming themselves must’ve been some sort of cosmic entity. That left him living anywhere between the B-Class and A-Class categories of Cuil Level. That meant a lot of different things, but Jack hoped to himself it’d mean a quick resolution.

“You sure you’ve got good things planned for me, Reptile?”

“Josiel Repidile. That’s my name.” He didn’t seem to catch onto the other man’s retort, drawing a sigh out of him.

_ Not going to be any fun if he doesn’t react,  _ he thought to himself, before giving up on that form of entertainment. “How about this, then. You beat me, and I go with you. That seems about how you’re ready to han-” He ducked just in time to watch a blinding glob of light fly past his line of sight, slamming into the wall behind him and sticking to it like super-glue.

...Okay. Perhaps a little classy.

* * *

 

Her surroundings seemed to be dancing a glorious song of its own profit. As Takeru guided her about by the hand, she could pick out all of the strange and distinct dances they were all doing. They all scrambled in her head, trying to find associations before observers began to help her fill in the blanks. Waltz... Polka... Mazurka…

Led along to the aisle filled with chorusing and gorgeous voices, songs such as  _ Ils Harmonisent Doucement _ and, taking a strange bubbly tone,  _ Treize Étapes _ , some odd ballad about 13 stages for… something. Magpie wasn’t sure what that word meant yet.

* * *

 

Twirling in place and leaping out of the way of another starglob firing, he skittered under flimsy metal tables and out the door, listening as heavy footsteps took to following him. He avoided looking into the eyes of curious, shocked pedestrians, all also Cosmic Dragons, as what likely looked like a shrimp to them all ran through the streets and away from their prized ranger. One good thing about them: they let rangers do their jobs uninterrupted, and thus he had less obstacles to worry about.

The Ranger had an elongated neck, something sometimes seen in the Cosmic Dragons. What isn’t sometimes seen, though, is the ability to stretch it out even longer. As he lagged behind his tiny, lithe target, the draconic humanoid began to snake his head towards the man while still lugging along his StarGattler.

For Jack, everything was disproportionately huge. Not so huge as to make the landscape notably larger, but big enough to make every path he took a little stranger. Taller tables, taller staircases, taller everything. Of course, this also meant that things that were tight for the dragons were likely to be regular old walkways for him. With this in mind, as he ran and avoided strollers and giant cars and other such oddities, he began searching for houses that seemed a little too close for comfort from afar.

“Get back here!!” Josiel roared, puffing out a disgustingly odorous concoction of what smelled like sulfur, sugar, and pure concentrated nightmares. Electing not to focus on how horrific the smell alone of it was, he twirled mid-run and dodged a black, void-like glob that fired past him, sinking to meet the floor and whittling through the cement.

He knew the beast was gaining - he could feel the vibrations of the monster’s footsteps even more so now - so he had to find a way out quickly. And then, he spotted it: A very slight gap in a metallic fence. So far as he’s seen, the star-matter can’t melt through anything unless it’s that black gunk. And since he didn’t fire it at him immediately when he was trying to capture him before…

Accounting for his own size, he dropped into a slide as he approached the gate at his own mach speed, tumbling past it and into its yard with an ‘Oof!’. Quickly getting up and dusting all of the magenta dirt and blue grass off of his person, he turned to look at the Ranger cockily. “And that’s how you avoid the Feds, you little ruffian! Don’t you worry, I give lessons on Mondays and Tuesdays!”

In response, the ranger began to pick apart the fence. That, of course, was Jack’s cue to get the hell out of there.

* * *

As Magpie was trying to discover the world around her, Takeru was beginning to discover - more and more - how much of a mistake it’d been to take this course of action. To ignore his gut and go out into the open world, believing it to be ready for any of this, was foolish from the get-go.

She was holding his artificial hand, so she wouldn’t feel how much his other hand was shaking.

He’d seen some of his former friends. Not a one of them noticed he was out and about, even when he sought out their attention. He tried not to be too invasive, but without even looking at him, they’d just ignore him or shoo him away, like they’d expected a young and needy child to be there instead of an old friend.

He didn’t want to take it personally, or take it seriously, but thinking about it made his eyes burn and he definitely wasn’t going to bust into tears in public.

_ Just, find something fun to do with the strange girl and take your mind off of things… _

* * *

 

Oh, if only that snot-nosed ‘hypnotist’ could see him right now. God, she’d have a fit of laughter. Dirt was caked under his nails from digging at the odd, chunky ground. He needed to make a portal for himself, and unfortunately he couldn’t be as cool about it as he did with his sliding trick. Hearing one piece of metal after another be pricked out made his heart speed up more and more, until it felt like someone was jackhammering his chest.

“Just stop it, little man! It isn’t worth it, come with me!” The lizard with the god-damned gatling gun said. Oh, yes, it  _ certainly _ wasn’t worth avoiding all that weird galaxy-gunk. Tell it to someone who’d believe it.

Slipping off his hat and digging deeper into it than it should be feasibly possible, he plucked up one odd little gem, it flashing in his palm as he held it. Then, tightening his thumb-and-finger hold on it, he sliced into the air contained in the hole and watched as the slit widened into a circle.

“YOU CAN’T FUCKING-” He began to shriek, but Jack was already going through, falling backwards into the portal while shooting the scaly fiend with the Middle Finger Duo. As soon as he was all the way through, the portal snapped shut - like an airlock on some sort of spacecraft.

And the only smart thing he could do was grunt, as he happened to have fallen backward into hitting his head on a large tree.

* * *

 

She’d noticed, through all of the wandering and monotonous speaking, that Takeru was not having the same learning experience she was. She looked up towards him, but no matter what, she just couldn’t meet his eyes. What had upset him? Was his usual dark mood something that just swelled up with no reason?

She had an inkling ‘sister’ had something to do with it. The phrase was extremely important to him, that much she could gather from the knowledge transfer. She didn’t know why the word was shrouded in so much emotion, though. The thought of just saying it made her feel strange, like she was watching a house on fire and nobody was coming to put it out anytime soon.

Not fair. Not fair. Not fair. Over and over and over. A pervasive feeling.

“Hey Tak-”

“Yeah?” He asked, obviously trying to sound pleasant when literal seconds before his voice sounded like the personification of ‘I Am Dead Inside’.

She hesitated. She couldn’t just go and ask him what ‘sister’ meant. She knew it was incredibly important. She knew whoever she is likely missed him. Had they been separated? Had she been…

The urge to ask swelled up even more, but she quickly squashed her urge to act on it. She couldn’t reason to herself why she shouldn’t tell him, besides ‘it feels weird to do right now’.

Instead she decided to ask, “Are you having fun?”

“Oh, of course! I love it in the Ambres Aesthete Market! It’s like a party every time!” His voice cracked at the end, and she couldn’t really tell what it was from. Puberty? Emotion? He didn’t look distressed…

The word ‘lie’ popped up in her head, and she immediately connected the context clues to herself.  _ Lying _ . He was lying to her. She didn’t particularly mind the lie, but she did mind that he obviously wasn’t having a good time and didn’t care about how he himself felt about it.

“Are you sure you’re having fun?”

“Yes! If I weren’t, I wouldn’t still be here right now.”

“This isn’t for me?”

“It’s for both of us, Magpie,” He said, obviously laying it on thick with his tone. Sighing to herself, she decided to not bother him anymore with questions.

* * *

 

Typically, the people who were hellbent on his bounty stuck to running after him. However, Jack had become carefully aware of not only Josiel’s incompetence, but also his true unwillingness. He had developed a sense for when a portal was going to immediately follow his portal. Call it Phantom Radiation or some other fancy name, he just called it his Sense of Disaster. He’s attracted a lumbering, large monster searching for his head into a city street many a time. Because of this fact, he stuck to the forest… initially.

But, when he noticed he wasn’t feeling that prickling anxiety in the back of his neck. The forest was not quite the place he enjoyed, he spent the entire time wandering and trying to get the gross pinkish soil from out of his fingernails. Yes, typically he did wear gloves, but was he going to ruin them by caking them in magenta gunk? Hell no. Was he going to ruin the inside of them by letting his currently nasty fingernails soil it? Also hell no.

However, due to the fact he wasn’t in a city at the moment and depending on his own tenacity and memory, he was struck with the realization that he’d left his handy little manicure kit at home. Or, well, whatever the hell that beat up apartment was.

On the edge of the forest, overlooking the fields… he came to notice a city. A city of golds and silvers and greens and blues, pinks and reds and other bright hues. He didn’t know how to really respond to the sight, but it did make his spirits lift exponentially.

...For a moment, he thought he heard something. But, assuming it to be a mosquito, as they were dreadfully common on Earth-like landscapes, he shooed the buzz away and began to approach.

* * *

 

Now Magpie was beginning to forget her previous worries. Takeru had brightened up exponentially from when the two originally headed out. She wasn’t sure whether it was a facade or not, but it was mostly because she was now trying to avoid that sort of thinking.

Takeru had guided her over to a slowly growing population of people sitting in front of a stage. He seemed to be genuinely happy looking at the growing crowd, and even gave her a little pair of glowing sticks to wave.

“This is the Allume Feu. It means ‘fire starter’, and it’s used to mark the start of a new period in life here in Ambres. A lot of people come here when they have aspirations for the future, and are looking forward to them.”

“Oh, so, that’s the reason we came?”

“...Mhm, there’s a lot of benefits to turning over a new leaf on a night like this.”

“I see…”

Marching on stage was a man wearing what appeared to be a handmade kimono, sporting patterns of lace and velvet almost paradoxically on his frame. Speaking joyously he began, “ _ Bienvenue à tous et à toutes, à la cérémonie d'allumage du feu ce soir! Pour célébrer le retour de tant de nouvelles relations, le feu rose sera placé en premier! _ ”

“Pink fire’s for romances,” Takeru clarified, still holding onto his glowing sticks, “Each person who’s gotten into a new romance usually has corresponding sticks, and sits with their new loved one to shake them together. It’s like a celebration for other people who have it good.”

“Ooh…”

The cheerful man approached what appeared to be a wooden barrel. He screwed a tiny lid on it open, and suddenly it burst alight with white fire. He held a strange pink item over the fire until the fire connecting with it became a rosy coloration, and then he approached what appeared to be a wooden sculpture of a withered rose and lit it with the pink flame.

To Magpie’s amazement, the structure seemed to be… healing. As if it weren’t fake at all, and just needed fire to replenish itself.

_ Les voilà, les quelques heureux. _

_ Bénis-les de chance et de charité. _

_ Laissez leur lumière fleurir toujours plus. _

Naive to the meaning of the words, Magpie could only sit and listen as Takeru and several others that weren’t herself repeated the chant, before hooting, hollering, and clapping as corresponding couples raised up their hands together to shake their hot pink glow-sticks.

“Alright, alright, settle down you all,” the cheerful man chuckled, now in a language Magpie could more easily understand, “There are a few unfamiliar faces among you all, so of course, I ask for you to pay attention! Tonight is special for you all. You’ll be encountering something new for yourselves, and even if you don’t understand it now, I hope you all grow to understand it later. À nos nouveaux arrivants!”

The man sealed the barrel again, before opening it once more. Flooding out was the newly purified white fire. He lifted up a gold emblem, placing it over the flame before what licked it was as golden as the item was. Then, he approached an odd sculpture. It resembled a small, fairy-winged kitten. When the man rendered it alight, the kitten’s eyes and heart lit up with gold.

_ Nos bénédictions vont à nos nouveaux amis. _

_ Que leur arrivée et leur départ soient entiers. _

_ S'ils partent, nous les porterons dans nos cœurs. _

Somehow, she felt appreciated. Now she knew what her own glow-sticks were for. Raising her golden glow-sticks in the air in time with some of the other new arrivals, she was showered with praise ranging from the hoots and hollers from before and the coos of people who no doubt thought the new arrivals’ attempt at fitting in was heartwarming.

“Okay, friends. Before this is over, we have to address a long dreaded reality. The permanent departure. The dead cannot participate tonight physically, but they can in spirit. Hold on tight to the blue, my friends. I have something ready.”

Takeru gulped to himself. Magpie had ceased shaking her glow-sticks, looking around a little. She didn’t see anyone holding blue…

And then her eyes landed on Takeru. In his hands were two glow-sticks that failed to glow. He was rigid, as if breathing visibly would make him a target for attack.

“...It’s alright, kid.” The man said to himself, before approaching the white barrel-fire again. Seal, unseal, white once more. He held out a single sheet of paper. She couldn’t catch what was on it, she could only vaguely make out the face of a young girl. The paper lit up with blue fire, but the paper didn’t burn.

“I will not say this in Ambrosian. I want all of us to pay respects tonight. Is that understood?”

The quietness said enough. Magpie fidgeted uncomfortably.

_ Tonight we mourn Wisteria Coggs. _

_ Even if she is no longer with us, she prevails. _

_ Our hearts and minds shall never forget. _

_ We Love You. _

Magpie almost felt as if her blood was beginning to run cold in her veins. This was what troubled him, wasn’t it? How could she not have guessed she’d passed? His guarded nature, keeping out of the room with the pink door… it was to keep her out of  _ her _ room. How could she not connect the dots together?

“Wisteria was a gift to us all. May her journey be swift and gentle.”

A sharp inhalation near her drew her attention to Takeru. His eyes were bubbling over with tears, but he wasn’t saying anything. He was clenching hard onto the dull glow-sticks, and they began to pulse to life with a deep blue.

Magpie began to notice that everyone else was still at their distances. They gave pitying and concerned looks, yes, but they weren’t doing anything. He was sitting there crying, and they continued to do nothing about it.

So she hugged him.

* * *

 

It felt like every sense of his was on fire. In a ‘good’ way, he’d assure you, not the literal way.

He could taste sound. Bubblegum pops tasted like chicken. Bike bells tasted like grapes. He could feel every single thing in the universe, from beginning to end, from end to beginning and even further than that. His eyes could see all of the little microbes and their parties and how often they fought with each other. He didn’t want them to fight anymore. He could hear every forethought, afterthought, and concurrent, errant little musing that made no sense but totally would’ve if he had true and meaningful context.

And yet, being aware of it, he hated every single second of it. He had a migraine the size of Earth J5-70 which, trust him, was a trillion times the size of Prime Earth and oftentimes smelled of horrible, nasty, withered variants of the common household bag of mothballs. And don’t get him started on the eldritch horror living underneath its surface.

All he could make out over all of the white noise that became the torrent of errant thoughts was “Ambres”. Ambres, Ambres, Ambres, they wouldn’t shut up about it for a god-damned second. Was this the place? The colorful town? The one he thought to be his temporary sanctuary before his Phantom Stone gathered back up enough juice? Oh, yes, it had to be, considering the exact tone and phrasing of it and all of its official languages had now been burned into his memory through the intrusive thoughts.

He was stricken into a state of wandering and aching. His head roared at him with his suddenly amplified senses, and his mind scrambled each time he tried to use the god-forsaken stone. He bumped into walls enough times to just become convinced that this sensory overload had rendered him functionally blind, considering he shut his eyes so tightly to try to alleviate at least some of the torture.

“Uh… you alright there?”

...And then all of it suddenly stopped.

Jack looked up at the two strangers. A tall boy and a small girl. He hadn’t even noticed himself, he’d crouched into a corner while holding his head. Or, at least, that’s what he realized he was doing just now.

“Hey there, uh… … Guy?” Takeru greeted uneasily.

“...Hello,” Jack replied, honestly not sure how to explain his current state.

“Like I asked, are you alright? You kinda-” “ _ Please _ don’t remind me,” he said quickly, before slowly beginning to rise to his feet. He ran his fingers through his hair, being sure not to tip over his hat before sighing. “Good… Gods, what the hell..?”

“What’s up with you? Are you okay?”

“I don’t know, I just suddenly got this horrible migraine. I… literally couldn’t function at all.” He didn’t know why he felt the need to be so open, so he chalked it up to what he was sure was a near-death experience to rival all the others. “Ugh, I need to get back home but I can’t go back yet.”

“Why’s that?” Magpie asked. Jack’s eyes flicked over to her before immediately flicking away, as if he’d approached looking a wild dog in the eyes. “My… ride’s not here, and he said he isn’t coming this time of…” he said it with slight disbelief as he regarded the dark sky, “Night.”

“Well, you’re lucky you ran into the charitable sort!” She chirped, blatantly disregarding Takeru’s hesitant look towards her. “He’s amazing with caring for others! He helped me when I crawled right out of a sewer!”

“A sewer? Really?” It wasn’t like he came built-in with the right to be incredulous, but a tiny girl crawling out of the sewers seemed far from the realm of possibility. If he were weird for thinking that, then fine, sue him. (Except don’t.)

“Yeah, really! You should’ve seen me, too!”

“Is she the type to tell tall tales?”

“She isn’t ly-”

“How DARE you make me out to be a liar?! I’m a scary alien,  _ punk! _ ”

“Uh-huh…” Jack chuckled, before looking to Takeru, “So, where’s this so-called refugee center she’s bragging about?”

Takeru spared his own sense of incredulousness to Magpie in a single look, but her resolve was unbroken. Sighing and knowing deep down this was a poor decision he said, “It’s over at my house. Follow me.”


	5. Disregarding Any Parent’s Advice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ill-advised kindness can sometimes lead to odd things.

Well, now Takeru had a mystery person and a half in his house.

He could either swallow down his pride and help this guy out until his ride came, or he could kick him out and look like a complete and utter jerk to someone he’d managed to be honest with in his own way.

He’d rather do the former, however uncomfortable it made him feel.

The friendly stranger - James was his introduction - was sitting comfortably and carefully on the couch, reluctantly watching the colorful shows Magpie flicked onto the TV.

“Do you watch these every day?”

“I’ve watched them every day since I’ve been here, which has been two days, so yes!”

“What’s so exciting about the purple one again? Just that she has wings?”

“She earned them after figuring out a spell that laid in wait for ten centuries, causing many issues to go unfixed because of its failure to be completed! When she completed the spell, she righted the wrongs, and helped her friends when they became affected by the spell initially as well! This earned her the title of-”

“Why are all the children’s shows in the places I’ve been in so odd and colorful? Things would be more interesting if they had a different aesthetic.”

“What? Like, fancy people doing fancy stuff?” Magpie put on a thick, downright disrespectful accent. “Excuse me, Mr. Fancipansque, (‘cause they hardly ever have a normal name,) would you like my Entirely Too Expensive Wine?”

“How do you know what wine is?” Takeru called from the kitchen, but Magpie continued as if she hadn’t heard his interjection, “Why yes, Ms. Highbridges-of-the-Huelands, I would indeed like your Entirely Too Expensive Wine and, alongside that, one of your 700 houses! And make sure not to let some streetly riff-raff-or-other come in on this only-two-person-wide party we are engaging in! This is not a date, no, we are both married, but our spouses are too busy holding their own little celebration, so we shall also hold our little celebration as well!” “That’s not how rich people-” “Aaaaand we’re also going to go outside with our pretty fancy outfits and make everybody else feel even poorer ‘cause they still haven’t won the Lottery Drawing!”

Takeru rolled his eyes as he brought in popcorn from his kitchen, the buttery scent wafting as he approached, “Funny story, actually, my family actually once won the Lottery. For 500 Aros, but still. We were pretty excited about it, y’know?”

“How’s it feel to be filthy rich?”

“500 Aros is just enough to get a part for a car or something. You can’t really buy  _ 700 houses _ with it,” he chuckled, sitting beside his new houseguest at a reasonable gap between them.

Of course, the gap was easily noticed. Magpie glanced behind herself and upon seeing the gap blurted out, “Oh, c’mon, get a little closer! This show’s about friendship, and in honor of it we gotta be friendly with one another! Besides, it’s only fair!”

Takeru’s eyes looked over to connect with James’ heterochromatic ones. Forest green on the left, and a purpley brown on the right. The two obviously held a sort of embarrassment in them as well, so Takeru knew he wasn’t alone in how dreaded this situation was. Rubbing the back of his neck and trying to defuse Magpie’s excitement he said, “This guy’s only going to be around for as long as he has to wait for his ride.”

“...Wait, so, he isn’t gonna stick around?”

“...No, sorry kid. I have a lot of places to go, things to do. If I neglect those things just because people are nice to me, then what’s the point in doing anything if I’m willing to drop it at the drop of a hat?” His posture lent to a perfectly timed ill tipping of his hat. It began to sway forward, before he immediately righted it, pointing at it briefly as if issuing a command before settling back into his position.

“...Oh. Dang it!” She shouted, giving James a strange and pouty look before returning to looking at her cartoons.

When Takeru was sure that Magpie was honed in on her horse show, he opened his mouth, “So, James, where’re you from? Obviously you’re not from around here. Your Common accent is so intensely… I don’t even know  _ where _ you’re from that you’re almost as weird as Magpie.”

He glanced over, to be met with a slightly inquisitive look. He opened his mouth briefly, before electing to close it.

“No offense to her or anything! It’s just, Ambrosian isn’t a language she’s learned and I grew up off of it. So… When someone comes around and doesn’t have an Ambrosian accent when they speak Common…”

“Oh! Oh, yeah, I getcha. Nah, I’m not from around here at all. I’m from way up north. I hardly come down here for anything besides visiting some of my friends. That’s kind of why I’m here.”

“I see, so is it hard to get back to your friend’s place on foot, ‘James’?” Takeru flicked a kernel of popcorn at him as he said it, as if emphasising his quotation marks. James squinted a little, before rolling his eyes, “Okay, fine. I assume in this world ‘James’ isn’t a common name or something.”

“Oh, no, it is, it just isn’t common up north. That’s where the more elegant names come from. Yuki, Taro, that kind of thing.”

“Ooh, I see, I see. So this is some kinda-”

“Listen, can you at least tell us your name so that if you leave and come back later, we’ll be able to call you by something you respond to if we recognize you.”

“Sorry to admit this to you, but that was the  _ entire point _ of that omission.”

At that remark, Takeru’s eyes narrowed as he stared at his ‘friendly’ houseguest. The houseguest did nothing but roll his eyes, before tipping the brim of his hat a little in the way of the other man’s gaze.

“What, do you have people after you?”

“No, no, I’m just not the type to socialize out of my clique.”

“Then why so suspicious?” He asked, tapping on the side of his popcorn bowl with a finger. Magpie groaned in the background. “If you’re not trying to avoid someone specifically, especially someone who’s a threat to you, why are you so insistent on hiding a first name? Is it that  _ special _ ? Is it that  _ famous _ ?”

He sighed, “Good gods, I didn’t expect you to try to grill me just because I have a nickname.”

“So it’s a  _ nickname _ now?”

“ _ I’m trying to watch my show!! _ ”

The two men looked down at the small girl, who was giving them the glare of their mortal lives. That being, a small girl’s glare laced with developing tears. “Can you  _ please _ move? This was getting interesting, but the two of you got  _ so- _ ”

“It’s okay, Magpie, we’ll  _ move. _ ” Takeru said kindly, adding an edge of irritation towards ‘James’ as he got up. “To my bedroom.”

Sighing to himself, but figuring the young man wasn’t some looming threat, ‘James’ got up from the couch and followed Takeru into his bedroom.

* * *

 

After the door closed behind him, Takeru launched into his words again, “Why is it that when two innocent people do you a kind favor, you reply to it with a false name and, quite possibly, a completely fabricated history that could be hiding god-knows-what from us?! Are you a burglar on the run?! A murderer?! A serial killer?!”

“Okay, firstly,” ‘James’ adjusted his tie and fixed his hat into a position where Takeru could once again meet his eyes, “Those last two things are the same, one just does it more than the other.”

“I’m not arguing-” He was interrupted by the raising of one gloved finger as ‘James’ continued, “And I will admit my name isn’t James, but it is instead…”

“Instead..? What kind of name is In-”

A cocky smirk lit up the man’s face as he took off his hat and let a surprisingly bright and colorful array of heatless embers and sparkles leap from the accessory, “Sir. Jack, part time gentleman, part time wrangler, and part time nuisance! ...Ah, wait, that last one needs work.” He stood back up to his full height as he contemplated what the true punchline for his introduction should’ve been.

Takeru stared at the slowly wavering display before pinching the bridge of his nose. How could he not come to the conclusion this guy was some sort of magician? Maybe not washed up, but on serious drugs? He was skinny, lithe, pale, brunette, and perhaps worst of all, his entire suit-and-hat outfit was based off of the color scheme of green and purple. ...Oh, hell, was he a supervillain? Did Ambrose even have those?!

“Get out of my house, Jack,” Takeru groaned. The other man could read in his tone that there was a slight hint of joviality in it, as if the sight had gotten to him by way of being something to laugh at or something to laugh with. Although he told himself he didn’t give a crap, he’d hoped just a little that it was the latter. “God… Dang it, is this a joke? An actual joke? Did one of my friends send you over to me to play entertainment games with me? Make me think you were suspicious?”

“...No, I just sort of came here and got down on my luck.”

“What the _ heck  _ was that then?!” He blurted out, gesturing at all of the glowy bits that were still flickering away. “What’s even going on?! Is this more spells?! Ambres doesn’t even do spells that much, and if we do it’s really menial junk or really significant stuff! Who uses magic for special effects for their freakin’ introduction?! That’s so  _ silly! _ ” It seemed as if he didn’t know whether to be righteously outraged or laugh, so he settled on the latter. “Oh, god, all this ‘being nice’ stuff is gonna wreck me someday.”

“Hah! Tell me about it,” Jack chuckled, putting a hand on Takeru’s shoulder, “I’ve seen crazier shit for crazier reasons! You haven’t seen anything until you see someone pull the mind control gambit! Or, hell, sometimes I’ve seen-”

“The what-now?” He asked, watching as Jack’s eyes narrowed just slightly, his smile still on his face. “Oh, y’know, ‘Oh, hey, I have superior technology so I’m taking over you now!’ That sort of dumb stuff! Shows up in movies all the time, but it never happens! ...In normal places, anyway.”

“Oh, uh.. Yeah!” Takeru chuckled awkwardly, sidestepping Jack’s loose grip on his shoulder. Something felt eerie about the entire room, now. He chalked it up to having suddenly been info-dumped by someone he hardly knew, and smiled uncomfortably. “Listen, uh, if you’re still down on your luck and your friend doesn’t pick you up, you can stick around for a while longer, but uh…”

“ _ But..? _ ” He asked, tilting his head a little and giving him a soft, surprisingly passive look.

“...I… … Ugh,  _ fine _ , you can stick around if nobody comes for you.  _ There. _ ” Jack chuckled at his apparent hesitance, hand-waving him, “Oh, don’t worry about it! If you get weirded out, I can just head out! I am a  _ gentleman _ , after all.”

Takeru thought to himself that his smile seemed a bit wide. His own smile crinkled a little in turn, at just seeing it. “Are you…”

“ _ Yes? _ ”

“Uh…”

“Go on.”

“Nevermind… I’m gonna… go…”

“Check on Magpie?” He smiled. It was overall quite pleasant, but still a tad wide. His eyes were half-lidded, as if he were as carefree as the wind.

“ _ Yeeeaaahh… _ ” Takeru replied, his voice cracking as he did. He circled around Jack as the other continued to meet his gaze, before nervously backing out of his own room and shutting the door in front of him.

* * *

 

After Takeru left, Jack felt like a paper-weight had fallen from his mind. He’d felt the compulsion to observe him, as if he really was a threat for just a few moments. Was it just apprehension? He did chalk up some of his best decisions to that sort of apprehension, but that young man was just that: a young man. He wasn’t some weirdo possessed by anything, he hardly had a grip on what magic was according to his surprise…

Or was he somehow one of the many people out looking for him? Even that possibility seemed scarce. Scarce enough to be laughable, even.

He rubbed the side of his head. What was going on?? He couldn’t let it elude him forever, while he had to move from place to place quickly, it didn’t mean anyone had to be hurt in the process of that.

So instead of following Takeru out of the room like a normal houseguest would, Jack began to pace. Think. Think, think, think.

This wasn’t Valentina. She was notably going on a break from her mind control and compulsion antics after a rather embarrassing defeat. ...Then again, she was always the type to clamor for revenge all too quickly. But this wasn’t like her at all. She usually just gave an order and you immediately felt it was the best idea. Plus, through what felt like years of experience, he’d found himself able to sense her charisma. His time antics had lent him that edge, so she was completely off of the table.

Were the Agents supplying themselves with some sort of mind-altering trickery? Even his frenemy found Valentina’s methods to be both horrible and alien to himself, so likely not. Unless it was new? Was it truthfully them?

...No. No, it wasn’t. His gut didn’t settle on that, so he didn’t either.

So who was it? As he paced, he kept crossing a mirror in the room. During his fourth pace, he noticed something out of the corner of his eye:

The reflection failed to follow him as he crossed it.

**_“You know, it’s taken me so long to get in touch with you again… Let’s talk, shall we?”_ **

He flinched, and spun to stare at the mirror. No. No, he wasn’t crazy, he’d heard that voice. Thoroughly interested as to what the hell was going on, he approached the mirror and crouched in front of it, tapping on the glass as if to see if it’d been a portal or not. It wasn’t.

**_“Oh, dear ‘Jack’, it’s been so long! I’m so happy to finally see your face. How have you been..?”_ **

It was at this point that his blood ran cold in his veins. That all-too-chipper voice and how he spoke to everyone as if he was already endeared to them. His voice and tone had burned itself into his mind. This wasn’t Valentina, nor the Agents.

That all-encompassing apprehension bubbled up within him. It was much like speaking to an overbearing loved one, someone with authority they oftentimes used to butt into their children’s lives. Any wrong move could send them into a frenzy.

Gulping down his pride to preserve himself he knelt onto one knee and said, “...Hello, sir..” It was all of his remaining pride to not sink down onto his hands and knees.

**_“Oh, there he is… My perfect little boy, how are you? Have you found some new friends? Some… old friends?”_ **

So that’s what he’d wanted.

**_“You know, you’ve been quite dodgy, lately. The whole timey-wimey business you’re going through has certainly caused quite a rift between us. Do you know how I could rectify this_ ** **_s_ ** **_s_ ** **_..?”_ **

Oh gods. That hiss. He knew something bad was coming every single time he’d heard it, and this time was no exception. Concentrate, Jack. Just, leave. Leave, and he won’t be able to do anything-

**“** **s** **s** **Sit down.”**

The action of “sitting down” had lost all of its grace with the command, as he dropped down onto his bum and crossed his legs. He couldn’t look away from his suddenly domineering reflection. His mind screech cries of ‘That’s Father’, while his much more sensible and 100% correct pieces of his mind desperately fought to shoo the other thoughts away with thoughts of ‘Run!’ and ‘This is bad! Go!’.

But if he ran while he was  speaking with him, he would’ve been  **bad** .

Father never really liked when he’d misbehaved. He liked avoiding getting **Father** angry, which is why he always **listen** ed, like a **good son.**

**Good sons listen to their fathers, you know? That’s why he’s the best. He’s a very good son, you know? He’s always made Father happ** Wait.

Jack scrambled away from the mirror, toppling Takeru’s bed onto its side to avoid even looking into it. He could sense his rage towards him, but if he just avoided paying any attention to him in particular…

He clenched his eyes shut. Breathe. Breathe in. Breathe out. Breathe in. Breathe out. Breathe in-

**_“You petulant, ungrateful little cur…”_ **

* * *

 

Takeru had already been thoroughly creeped the heck out.

He wasn’t a fan of being stared at. Though, admittedly, he doubted that anyone was. Was that guy always like that? No, he doubted it.

He sighed, walking back over to the couch. The colorful show was still on the TV.

“Hey, uh, Magpie, how do you feel about James?”

“Oh, I was wondering when you’d ask that!” She chirped, spinning her head around to look at him, “Actually, I kinda got this funny feeling when I saw him!”

“Funny feeling?” He repeated back. He prayed to himself that she was psychic or something. Could she tell something was off, too? If she could, then maybe he wasn’t being paranoid.

“Yeah, like I… Oh! Like I recognized him! Yeah, that’s it!”

“Recognized him? You didn’t say anything when we first found him.”

“Hey, it was dark out! Plus, it’d be super weird to just accuse someone of being somebody you know when you first met them!”

“Guess that’s true,” he’d conceded. For once he felt that veil of apprehension beginning to lighten up on him.

 

**Crash!**

 

Takeru leapt onto his feet, while Magpie scrambled to get onto hers. That precious little time feeling back to his old self had gone away in that instant.

“...Uh.. you can come if you want, but-”

“Alright, robber, that’s it! We let you in our house, and you go and plunder our stuff?! That isn’t fair, and I’ll teach you NOT to steal!!”

Smiling awkwardly, he watched as Magpie hurried in front of himself to bum-rush the bedroom door. Biting back his concern, he followed after her.

Bursting in with a surprising yet totally expected amount of vigor for a small girl, Magpie went into an ill-thought-of karate pose before almost losing balance. Sighing her embarrassment away and looking around the room, she noticed one thing:

Nothing could have possibly made the crash.

To call the room “clean” would be a hilarious understatement. Not only was it clean - no - it also was radiating an air of “hardly anyone has ever lived here”. As a matter of fact, Jack was making the bed for Takeru. Between all of the glances of the bed she’d managed while she stayed there, she’d never seen it more tidy.

“Oh! Hello there, you two! Sorry if I surprised you, I tripped, made a bit of a mess of the bed. I’ll have it all fixed up in just a moment.”

Oh. That was James. Still decked out in his all-too-fancy outfit. Or, well, too fancy to be from anywhere near Ambres. She fidgeted a little. She couldn’t pinpoint why exactly, but something felt off.

“Magpie, tell me, how does the bed look?” He asked it with full expectation of reply, walking over to stand beside her. “I also noticed the look of the rest of the room. I figured being a little nice while mooching off of you two would be fitting.”

“I’ve literally never seen it cleaner in my life,” she said bluntly.

“Yes, well, you’ve got to get used to this! Quite orderly, I might add. I  _ love _ it this way, don’t you?”

She didn’t know why in the moment, but it felt like every hair on her stood up on end for a second in a wave, before settling back into normalcy. She looked behind herself to regard Takeru, who seemed to be experiencing an unease as well, though likely for different reasons. She looked back over to James, confidence in her reaction setting in, before saying, “Hey, uh, when do you think you friend’s gonna come pick you up?”

“On his own time, in his own way,” he admitted, sighing, “He isn’t the most reliable person on the planet. I’m just going to have to stick around until he gets here.”

“And how long until he does that?”

“It could take a few more hours or a few more days. He’s never really been the type to drop everything to help somebody else, you know? I’ve just got to be a little patient with him. Takeru’s patient with you, right kiddo?”

“Yeah, but, that’s ‘cause I’m staying here for a way longer time than you are,” she said, again neglecting tact. “I’m a forever-stay, you’re a… not-forever stay.”

“Ah, so that’s how it is, huh? You’re worried you’re going to have to share his attention with me?” He knelt down next to Magpie, drawing in her attention. “That’s not what I-” “I know you didn’t outright say it, but that’s something that comes with good intuition. I just know these things.”

“Well, don’t use your ‘in-too-ishon’ on me. It’s weird.”

“Hah! That’s what everybody says when they hear about it. S’fine, Magpie, I’ll not stay too, too long if it makes you antsy.”

“It isn’t making me antsy!”

“Whether it is or isn’t, it doesn’t really matter. I’ll do my best to make me being around as comfortable for you as I can. Now, do you wanna go watch  _ That Little Pony Show _ ?”

Why was he suddenly interested in the show? Magpie glanced behind herself again. Takeru was in the middle of stepping towards the kitchen, and when he noticed she’d turned to see him, he mouthed, ‘Go to the kitchen if anything weird happens.’

Duly noted.

She turned back to the gentleman, “I guess we could, maybe. Do you like the show?”

“I like any show with tons of color. Quite the sights, I’d say.” He said this while leading her back over to the living room.

“Who’s your favorite?”

He flopped down onto the couch, before settling into a withdrawn and rigid sitting position, “The pink one with the lavender hair and white hair. She’s quite the sass.”

“She’s a jerk, though.”

“Jerks can be  _ quite _ entertaining.”

“Says you.”

* * *

 

Slowly, Magpie swayed back into consciousness. Had she fallen asleep? She hadn’t opened her eyes just yet, but she could sense she was still in front of the couch.

Her head felt a dull ache. The type of migraine that made you want to keep your eyes closed in fear of coming face-to-face with horrendous, painful light. But she still opened her eyes anyway.

...Why was everything so dark?

This was darker than night. It was like there was no moon to show itself. No natural light. The artificial lights weren’t spoken of, either.

She sighed. Was it storming? She didn’t hear any rain outside. She leaned a little forward, burying her face in her hands. This migraine just felt like the addition to a whole new laundry list full of issues.

“Tak? Takeru?!”

“He isn’t here. He’s out.”

“...James? Did your friend not pick you up yet?”

“We need to talk.”

“Can we talk later? My hea-”

“We  **_need_ ** to talk, I said.”


	6. Having the Talk with Someone Ungrateful

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You should've stayed in your lane.

_ Bad things happen to bad people. _

_ But not me. I’m not bad people. I’m good people. Good people who get lost in the woods and end up slaughtered in horror movies. _

_ Dad used to say that if you got scared, you could go back to Him, always. What happens if you’re scared of  _ **_Him_ ** _ though? Are you stuck? Are you forced to have to always come to someone you’re scared of going to? _

_ That isn’t fair. That’s why I left. _

_ Bad people leave their family behind, but some good people do it too. _

_ That’s what I’ve learned, from all of this. Good people get scared, and sometimes the only thing they can do about it is leave. _

_ It’s okay to leave out of fear. _

_ Even if they get angry with you. _

_ Even if they want to find you. _

_ It’s okay to be afraid. _

_ You can go. _

_ Please go. _

* * *

 

The migraine wasn’t going away anytime soon.

So it lingered, like something festering and angry. Like it was angry at her specifically, and because it could cause her pain, that’s all it had the drive to do.

What talk had he even wanted? He’d sounded so upset with those words in and of themselves. Like saying it was an insult against him as a person.

“You and me have some time to ourselves, so now is the time to have this talk.”

His tone was off. Different. A little familiar, and yet not.

She groaned, “Can you at least find a way to help me nurse this godforsaken headache? If you’re gonna lecture me, at least show some hospitality!” Said headache felt like claws were digging so hard into her scalp that she was surprised to not feel blood running down and across her face.

“...It’s funny, the more you talk to me like that, the less it makes me want to help you.”

“I don’t CARE, just get it over with so I can stop aching!”

With her shout, there was a reverb. The silence settled for a moment. And then… an ugly, vicious sound. Laughter, from the gentleman. “Ah, I apologize!” His tone was somewhere between sincere and mocking. Slowly, Magpie opened her eyes, and saw

* * *

 

_ “JACK!!” _

_ The call was cacophonous, vicious, furious. A melding of all of the noises you’d never want to hear, but spoken in just enough of a cadence and tone to warrant being called a “voice.” _

_ Jack jolted upright at the sound of it, and he rubbed the side of his head, groaning. He looked around, taking in rather odd surroundings. He was surrounded by clashing sights of giant valuable jewels of gorgeous amethyst hue, and giant, interdimensional knick-knacks that he’d attached just a tad bit too much of memory to in a green hue. _

_ He could even pick out the Phantom Stone, glistening dully under octarine glow. _

_ As his senses came back to him, he heard something softly droning - a melody he could’ve sworn he’d heard millions of times, but it wasn’t grating. It floated listlessly and powerfully, helping him wake up. _

_ He slowly got up to his feet, stretching and cracking his joints. As he did, he winced internally at the sound of the cracks reverberating. _

_ “..Ungh, how long was I down?? ...Wait.” He felt a twinge of worry, squinting at his surroundings and analyzing it in depth. _

_ “...All of these things are familiar to me,” he thought aloud, “Fuck… What’s happened this time?” _

_ He heard the cacophonous voice again, though this time it was a mischievous giggle. His eyes instinctively moved to look to the source. At the end of a road - one he’d previously had been lying on - was a throne. Seated in it was Jack. _

_...Wait. _

_ “Wait, hold on, I’m pretty sure the expiration date on my sanity has passed so many times it looped back around to me being perfectly sane.” _

_ “Supposedly!” _

_ “So what are you doing here?” _

_ “I’m here..” The copy began, looking at his perfectly cared for hand, decked out in glittering jewelry that intergalactic pirates would whisper of for eons. _

_ “...To better you, Subject 14.” _

_ “Better me?” Jack scoffed. The idea of it - and the fact this thing had that audacity - felt insulting. “I’m already better. I bettered myself a long time ago.” _

_ “Oh, no no no, you see, you have a very twisted perception on what is better or worse. I am here to guide you, to help you make better decisions with your life. After all, you have plenty of time to make mistakes.” _

_ “So I can make as many as I want?” _

_ “So you can lessen the amount of mistakes made, omit any that are made, and become a living god.” _

_ “...Or that too,” he hummed, rubbing his chin with a thumb and forefinger. _

_ “The two of us are made to understand each other, Jack. I am your Ideal, as you are my Host. If we work together, we shall better ourselves and look off into an even more powerful future. One where the very thought of going against you is something unheard of.” _

_ The thought, indeed, was quite fascinating. To become a living god, to conquer all possible challenges, to never have to wade through the sludge that was what felt like running from the interdimensional police (InterDiPol) every five seconds. _

_...It was very, very tempting. So tempting that… _

_ “If you agree to team up with me, we will bond our abilities together. I will be able to assume your form at will, powering through anything you yourself cannot stomach. Your goals shall be mine, and mine yours.” _

_...Jack knew something was off. The preposition was already very odd - after all, he wasn’t one for just handing control off to another person. If he were going to become a living god, one of many, he would earn such a right himself. If he had earned it himself, after all, not a single person would be able to wrest it away from him. And if they managed to, they’d have done it while he was finally, truly, actually dead. _

_ “...So, Ideal Me, if you’re so sure of that title-” “That is my official designation and I appreciate all appropriate usages of such.” _

_ Squinting his eyes a little and gesturing at the other him he said, “Yeah, well, how do I better myself even more? Go into more detail here, you going ‘we make a deal’ isn’t very descriptive.” _

_ “Ah, well, when the deal is verbally agreed to, the next big step is to shake my hand.” Ideal Jack’s smile gleamed as he said this. _

_ “Yes, and then what happens?” _

_ “And then? Well, then-” _

_ “He has to do with you, doesn’t he?” _

_ “What of it?” _

_ “I want nothing to do with this.” _

_ “Of course you don’t, that’s why I’m here.” _

_ “What do you-” _

* * *

 

“You see, young madam, I come here in search of something important. And that ‘something important’ happens to be yourself.” He circled around her, hands behind his back as if she were nowhere near a threat to him. “Father has been looking for you for what feels like eons. And He’s been looking for me, as well.”

“Father?” She groaned, rubbing the sides of her head.

“Oh, come now, don’t act new. You are Subject 13. You abandoned Father a mere 2 weeks ago. To Him, however, it has felt like forever,” he put his hands in his pockets, looking around before looking down at her, “Your ‘caretaker’ has left the home for the time being. He is out gathering groceries, and I seemed trustworthy enough to be left alone with you. He reasoned to himself it would  _ only be a little while. _ ” He chuckled darkly, as if the irony of it was known only to him. “So you see, dear 13, you are alone.”

She winced at the sound of his voice. It was much unlike the glimpse of ‘James’ she’d come to know. He looked like the Cheshire Cat, eyeing someone who’d wandered woefully astray. His grin stretched until it met the outer corners of his eyes. Purring out his next words he said, “And if you would like for this encounter to be truthfully, harrowingly peaceful, I will make it very clear to you: you needn’t reason. You needn’t cry. You needn’t argue. You simply need to  _ come with me. _ That’s all you need to do.”

“...But 13 isn’t my name. It’s Magpie.”

His eyes narrowed until all she could differentiate were his sclera and the vicious glare of his purple and green eyes. His mouth became an emotionless line on his face.

“You actually gave yourself a name, too? How  _ far _ were you willing to go with this?”

“My life is mine now, it isn’t his anymore.” Filling herself with a false sense of bravado, she stumbled slightly before gaining sure footing. “I ran because I didn’t wanna be under his thumb anymore. Isn’t the concept something you remember? Something you know well?”

“If I were ever such a traitor I would be ashamed. But I am not. I was not. I continue not to be.”

“...But that’s a lie.” Her voice didn’t raise in tone or volume, but its power seemed to raise enough for Jack to narrow his eyes. The other gawked at her as if she were an ant encroaching on a lion. “I know you left him.”

“ _ I did not leave Him, _ ” he hissed, “ _ you petulant child _ , don’t change the subject. The longer you are out like this, the longer your grief over lost time with Him will be.”

“I won’t grieve time lost with him, because he’s  _ horrible. _ ” She said, eyes downcast.

He groaned, “Talking with you is so tiring. You  _ actually _ think you can think for yourself.” He flicked his arm out, and began to materialize a glowing, utilitarian spear, though its spiked sides definitely spoke to sadism. “If you want your ‘freedom’ so badly…”

Magpie jumped back as he pointed the sharpest end of the spear at her, “You need to prove you can even survive ‘freedom’.”

* * *

 

_ The Ideal had launched a surprise attack on the original, but that didn’t mean he would win instantly. Jack was a classy fighter, most of the time, but he didn’t have an audience. So he did all he could to get this invader off of him - he clawed, scratched, gouged, but felt those burning and sharp pains rebound right back onto him. _

_ It wasn’t that he wasn’t used to pain, but it felt amplified. Much worse than he could’ve ever imagined. Much worse than the same injuries delivered to him prior felt. _

_ “You’re feeling it, aren’t you?” his doppelganger purred, burying his nails into Jack’s cheek as he held the other’s battered face. “Every little rebellion, given back to you twenty-fold. How long will you lie to yourself about this?” _

_ He tossed his better half across the throne room, before sprinting towards him. Pulling out a large lance out of nowhere, Jack raised it by its handle to hold off the Ideal’s attack. However, instead of barreling into it carelessly, he skidded to a stop and glared. _

_ “You are  _ my _ parody, ‘Jack’. I am you, but if everything went right. If everything went according to the natural order.” He materialized his own lance - it was larger, prettier, and perhaps most importantly, it looked like it’d hurt a hell of a lot more. “I am literally better than you. Better than you on all fronts. My entire life is to succeed you, and be better than the  _ speck _ that preceded me.” _

_ “I can tell you’re me,” he groaned, “you talk too damn much.” _

_ “Flattering,” the double growled, jutting his lance under Jack’s lengthwise hold, before using his own strength to lever him across the room yet again - only this time, without his lance. Noticing the absence quickly, Jack snapped his fingers and the lance suddenly began to shiver with light, before flying after him at the speed of a bullet. Ideal Jack held on still, hitching a ride towards his opponent. _

_ As his lance reached him, so did the Ideal. The two got their lances from one another, and stood at fair distances from each other, though the Ideal was beginning to inch closer. “Are you about ready to give up now? This isn’t fun anymore.” _

_ “Really?” Jack began, spitting out a tooth that found itself right back into place a moment later, “I’m having an amazing time.” As he spoke, his wounds began to heal themselves. His mind, his mind’s body. He had almost forgotten. _

_...But just as he thought he’d figured everything out, his wounds began to reopen. He shot a glare at the Ideal as his tooth loosened into falling out yet again. “You don’t look it. Yet you haven’t left a permanent mark on me. Poor, poor thing.” _

* * *

 

The walls were littered with shining, glittering spears that reeked of danger. He’d fired them at her like bullets, and she’d dodged each one. Still firing, still dodging, the girl began to leap onto the sharp-sided spears, gaining puncture wounds and cuts as she attempted to dodge quicker and quicker firings.

“You’ll tire yourself out,” Jack said bluntly, making note of every bead of sweat that formed, and every slight delay that was mere milliseconds away from being her last milliseconds alive. “When you tire yourself out, I’ll kill you.”

“No you won’t!” She yelled, her sprinting becoming a four-legged gait. Jack simply kept firing, his arms and fingers arranged to look as if he were rapid-firing a bow and arrow. The spears were forming and being launched at a rate so quick that it looked like he was firing continuous streams of light that broke off at the last second.

“Do you intend to die a traitor?” He was done playing games, and it showed. The sickening enjoyment plastered on his face was long gone, and replaced with a stern determination. He didn’t have anything to look forward to, besides the success of his mission. And even then, it would be boring.

“I don’t intend to die at all!!” She replied, hissing in pain as she began to rush up the impromptu staircase the spears had created. Not fully formed, but still painful, her running became less quick as blood began to pepper the spears she was climbing on.

The gentleman glared, watching her as she ran and made more and more mistakes. What a waste. He began to calmly walk up the staircase of spears, the spears piercing but not even drawing a wince from him. “Intention for you doesn’t matter, you know? You’re dead whether you want to be or not.”

She kept scrambling, gritting her teeth through incredible pain. Her goal? The odd ceiling-facing door, placed on the ceiling for some reason. She’d asked about it before. An ‘attic’, Tak called it. Well, if it was a different room, she’d find refuge there, if only for a second or two.

So she reached it, and leapt inside, scurrying from the door in enough time to avoid being impaled from underneath herself.

* * *

 

_ As the two duked it out, the area around them withered away. The floor would quiver and shiver as they fought, giving them unstable footing, before it’d fall through and cause them both to lose their composure as they fell deeper. Deeper. _

_ And eventually, they landed somewhere dark and hard and cold. Somewhere where nothing seemed of promise. Both of them glowed, their individual colors shattered into streaks of monochromatic light. The original glowed of emerald, and the Ideal glowed of amethyst. _

_ “A valiant effort, I will admit,” the purple one said, narrowing his eyes. “You’re the type to keep fighting, I can tell. To keep you down I’d have to make you my business at all hours.” _

_ “Good,” the green groaned, “I don’t fucking want you up there. I want you deep, deep down here. Somewhere in my subconscious, to get lost where I never think of you again.” _

_ “So this is where you send all those who think they can puppeteer you.” He was cold, and held his lance loosely, as if he was extremely secure in his own abilities. “This will be a disappointment to hear, but it won’t be that easy this time. All those people clawing at you, trying to get at your name… Will not come even close to what I’m going to do to you.” _

_ Jack was suddenly alarmed. He couldn’t pin it down on something, but everything felt wrong. He tried not to show it, but the darkness around them suddenly felt darker, heavier, colder. The other Jack grinned at him, but his voice was just as ravaged by boredom as it had always been, “I take it you’re picking up on it. How distracting I am. How about the two of us go to the part of the brain where you can see what you’ve been doing? I’ll be good. I won’t hurt you while we go there.” _

_ “What I’ve been-” He paused. He wanted it to be a shock to him, but no matter how much he fished within himself to muster shock, or even fright, it wouldn’t truly surface. Instead surfaced the feeling of a sinking heart, or a heart leapt into the throat. The anxiety that bursts from within and takes you when you know something is wrong and you can’t reverse it. _

_ “...What we’ve been doing,” the Ideal purred, “is trying our best to please Father. You remember him, don’t you?” _

_ He couldn’t figure out how to react, or how to even feel. Nothing felt real, nothing made sense, and for those precious milliseconds he wanted to laugh at this. He was fighting to get him out, but how in the hell did he not realize he could pilot him at the same time? Not that he could. No, that he  _ would _ be piloting him at the same time. _

_ Like a marionette on strings, but his nerves were beginning to ache of how tightly he maneuvered those strings. _

_ “...I suppose you’ve settled down, now. My intent was never to harm you.” His bored and cynical voice suddenly seemed slightly light and airy. “Do you want to watch? Do you want to see what we’re up to, out there? I can’t let you control things again. I’m very busy with us.” _

* * *

 

Magpie had scurried to the darkest corner of the attic, holding her breath. She was surprised at how roomy it seemed, and how she actually felt secure hiding there. She shut her eyes as she hid, knowing full well that if something jumped out at her she’d jump as well. Then she’d be caught. Captured. Taken back to him.

“ _ To render aid at times of need, _ ” she quietly said, “ _ I open up my heart to feed. _ ”

The hell was that? Her thoughts must have been spilling out her mouth, now. She bit her bottom lip to keep herself from spilling more, before opening her eyes briefly.

The attic door was open, and light from the previously fired spears was pouring into the attic.

Her breath hitched, and she held it for a minute. Her eyes darted around fruitlessly, as darkness and light was all she saw.

“Magpie,” the gentleman’s voice called out, his tone dripping with vitriol, “Why is it that you always have to make things so difficult for me? For us?” Her eyes scrambled to try to meet the source of the sound, but she couldn’t hone in on it. It was impossibly difficult for her. The instinct to try to meet the source of a voice was as lost as her rational mind was.

“You know,” she could hear the smile on his lips, “Father specified to me that you needed to be in a treatable condition. But I remember clearly, one of those days, a tattered and bloodied corpse of one of our brethren was dragged in and worked on. Next day, good as new, and wholly loyal to the one who’d brought him back. That was the Vessel of Obedience, remember? Do you not remember how articulate he was on how you should  _ never betray Him? _ ”

She bit back her scathing reply, only staring out into everything as she tried and fail to spot him.

“...Or, and this is possible, you’re not even up here.”

She held her breath.

“...I could be rambling blindly into the air, not a peep from you or anything that could interrupt me. You are utterly harmless to me, so I can do as I please.”

She registered the pain before he even said his next words.

“Or I could just shoot to kill anything that could be here.”

And after that was an explosion of ache. Firing out of him at all sides were the spears, and one hit her squarely in the gut. A scream rocketed out of her mouth before she even realized she was making noise.

Hurt. Everything hurt.

She felt something wavering.

* * *

 

_ Ir fogah, si tepoha kartaha youwei. Si tira ti vucot si tiliw waph loaw. Jaka si tir vucot, vur coi ui diwhaf. _

<One three, I have discovered things. I did not know I could live alone. Now I do know, and it is fun.>

_ Coi ui lodeg ekess siofme di svanoa moxt yth shio vucot. _

<It is insane to think of how little we all know.>

_ Yth tir ti vucot zyak throden youwei. Si tuor wer krehl ekess vucot nomenes youwei, vur si tuor wux ekess tepoha batobot krehl. _

<We do not know so many things. I want the chance to know those things, and I want you to have that chance.>

_ Opsola naktada nomenes krehlic de udoka. Batobot ui ti filkiati. _

<Father kept those chances from us. That is not justice.>

_ Batobot ui wer vemud di filkiati. _

<That is the opposite of justice.>

_ Mrith itov, huena ir vrrar. _

<With love, once one four.>

* * *

 

Thirteen,

I never meant to get so out of touch with you, you know?

You probably will not understand this until later. Common is kind of weird to learn.

Just use the Knowledge Spell, though! That way you don’t have to “learn” it.

Maybe I should put a translation spell on this, too, while I’m at it. That way no matter what I write this in you’ll understand.

I don’t want you to be stuck in there anymore, Thirteen. You have to see what the world outside is like!

Or the worlds.

…

I’ll talk to you later!

Once Fourteen.

* * *

 

I’ve been in an accident, Thirteen.

I don’t know what to do.

But, you won’t have to worry about losing me anytime soon.

I’m going to go looking for something very potent.

If you don’t hear from me again, then I guess that’s it.

I’m sorry.

(Hopefully not) Goodbye,

Once Subject Fourteen.

* * *

 

I haven’t written to you in quite a while, haven’t I?

Thirteen, if you’re still out there, I’m still out there too.

I just wanted to give you the chance to write back to me.

Attached to this note will be a very specific spell. I want you to learn it.

It will let you pull from anywhere in your memory and draw it into reality.

It comes at little cost, only absorbing some magic.

But you know how we work, Thirteen. If that’s still your name.

For us, magic is barely a quantifiable being. It’s powerful and legendary, and fights all odds.

You know what a pencil looks like. Draw it, yank it, and then throw it outside of your window.

I hope to hear back from you.

With Love, Former Subject Fourteen.

* * *

 

You learned it very well. I’m actually pretty excited!

I suppose it was rude of me to tell you to use the Knowledge Spell while never giving you the instructions on how to do so.

So, I’ll rectify that now. Note: You’ll need a second person for this, one that has the knowledge you seek.

Step 1: Establish a passing understanding of the person’s personality, whether it’s shallow or not.

Step 2: Place your forehead against theirs. While consent is not necessary for the spell, I would suggest that you acquire it. It does make the activation of the spell less startling.

Step 3: Activate it. You know how passive that is for us. Close your eyes tight, and think about the spell extremely hard. So hard you can’t think straight. And when you open your eyes, it will be happening.

Good luck to you on your future endeavors!

With Love, Sir Jack. (That’s my new name! Is it fitting? Write me back!)

* * *

 

_ “ _ **_No!!_ ** _ ” _

_ He watched as the spear ripped through her small form and buried itself into the wall a distance behind her. The girl clattered to the ground lifelessly soon afterward. When she fell, it was bloodless. She lay there, a splayed doll on the wooden flooring of the attic. _

_ “...So she chose to learn the hard way what happens when betrayal-” _

_ Jack would’ve been surprised at himself, if he were even thinking. He had lunged for the other, and wrapped his hands tightly around his corrupted mirror image. _

_ “Zyak batobot ui svabol itrewicric ekess wux. Si ocuir jaka.” _

_ “ _ **_SHUT UP!!!_ ** _ ” _

_ The other chuckled using his straining vocal chords, “I finally... got that  _ hate _... out of you.” _

_ A battle cry tore out of Jack’s throat as he continued the violent strangulation of his worse half. He threw the other into the wall, the one projecting the image of Magpie’s lifeless form, and watched as the visual cracked. _

* * *

 

As he loomed over one of his many successes, he felt a sharp ache, right between his eyes. He groaned, pinching the bridge of his nose and massaging his temples.

* * *

 

_ Jack stared at the crack. It was slowly beginning to seal itself back up, but Jack leapt at the screen and striked out at it, letting out barely subdued cries of rage and sadness. _

_ The other, temporarily subdued, slowly began to regain his bearings. Everything seemed to ache on him, and his tricks weren’t sending them over to his inferior anymore. _

_ He had finally hit the one chord he shouldn’t have. _

_ As Jack screamed and raged at the mental screen, his body dealt with the sudden onset of an extremely severe migraine. _


End file.
